The Gift
by shywr1ter
Summary: S1, ML.  November 11th, and Logan's birthday ... his first after his injury.  Canonsafe, predictable, but then, aren't most birthdays?


**Disclaimer:** Characters courtesy of Dark Angel (and by reference, NCIS); no profits made on anything here.

**A/N:**** It's November 11!! **Logan Cale's birthday! So it's time for another birthday fic, in response to a rather generic "let's write birthday fic for Logan's birthday" sort of challenge. However, suggestions did include it being his first birthday after the shooting, and involving baking. So... here's this year's present for Loogie, and for all the other obsessive-types on DAR, BBWW and elsewhere... Special thanks to Mari for once again patiently reading a draft with all its gaps and typos.

Character note: more stealing from my own stories. In my demented brain, Logan has a cousin with whom he's very close – but if you haven't read the cross-overs, it's okay, just replace him with any ol' generic cousin and you'll be fine. (I promise, Mia!)

**No present for Logan? S'okay – drop me a review and I'll tell him it was really for **_**him!**_  
(seriously: feedback appreciated!)

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

_**The Gift**_

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

**Fogle Towers  
Seattle, Washington  
November 11, 2019**

Logan Cale sat alone in the silent penthouse, the elegant surroundings lit only by the dim grey light of an overcast sky. Just a handful of minutes earlier the mailman had come up to his place to deliver a large box, thoughtfully bringing it in to leave it on the floor near the dining table.

He'd peered at the return address before seeing the man out, and now returned to pry open the box, anticipation brightening the day. His cousin never forgot his birthday, and always made him smile with his choices. Just as always, when he thought of Tony now, he also felt a little prickle of guilt and discomfort, having not seen him in so long. It was even worse now, he prodded himself – _one of these days it's gotta be faced, and Tony's going to have to be told what a bullet in the spine can do to someone ... even his own cousin. _

But he forced the brooding out of his thoughts, pleased as always that, no matter how busy, Tony always managed to find something to send something to his "li'l cuz." Over many of Logan's last birthdays, Tony's gift had been the highlight of an otherwise solitary day, and he attacked the box with a hope that once again, his cousin would lift his spirits...

Moments later, spirits decidedly broken, he managed to lift the card, opening the typical DiNozzo card festooned with barely clad, buxom girls, to read the cheery scrawl inside: _"Hey, cuz, pick a week, pack these babies up and meet me on Grand Turk – or Belize; remember that nude beach with the all-girl's school reunion weekend? Classic._

"_Happy Birthday, Logan – call me. It's time for another cuzins trip._

"_Tony."_

Logan's eyes slowly closed in pain, as he dropped the offending flipper, along with the card and snorkel, back into the box.

_Swim fins. _

He opened his eyes again to stare at the expensive swimming equipment, colorful brochures tucked beside them advertising scuba vacations in tropical waters, healthy, happy couples running along a beach, hopping all over the dive boat...

_Not much use for them now, or the mask and snorkel for that matter, Tony, but you couldn't know that, could you? At least Bennett kept his pledge not to tell him, _Logan laughed in silent bitterness,_ and Jonas and Margo are too ashamed of me, especially now, to even admit what's happened... _ Slowly dropping the box flaps back over the vibrant blue of the fins, he left the large box where it was and moved away, toward his computers. He'd offer them to Bling; if the therapist couldn't use them himself he'd know someone who could.

_A patient, maybe ... a patient who beat the odds, made it back on his feet..._

Logan snorted at himself, gritting his teeth and breathing out the frustration burning in him. He'd thought he was past the worst of it; that he'd shaken the most bitter of his anger about the shooting ... and the results.

_Apparently not, Junior; not only are you still in the chair and moping about it, but you haven't managed to tell Tony you won't be joining him on those 'guy-weekend-adventures' anymore. What's worse? Telling him and having to face the DiNozzo reaction to __**that**__... or letting him think that suddenly you don't have time for him anymore?_

He never made it to his computer. Once again, defeated, Logan found himself in front of the panorama that was his world now, his window perch overlooking the city, and he stared out over Seattle, unseeing, a feeling in his gut of impossibility and grief. He had no idea how long he'd been there when he heard his door open, the security system as always disarmed and rearmed in milliseconds.

_Not Max... not __**now**__. Not like this..._

At the sound, Logan barely moved, knowing that even on his feet he'd never have been able to stash the large, obvious box out of sight before Max made it into the room, so the best he could do was to ignore it and hope, as ridiculous as that was, that she wouldn't notice.

"Hey Logan," the bright, airy voice called to him, and without a lost beat, her steps veered away from her path toward him to the open box, on the floor. "What's this?"

It was enough to jolt him into action. As Logan turned to see Max moving toward Tony's gifts, peering in expectantly, he scrambled to flip off his brakes and head her off, knowing he had no hope of beating her there – she was already reaching inside just as he started moving. "Just ... some computer parts I ordered..."

She gingerly lifted a bright blue fin up for inspection as he crossed the room, staring at it without looking back to him. "...but they mixed up the order and I ... no; wait, Max, don't..."

But she bent again, now lifting the colorful, suggestive card out of the box, and was reading it, her cheery, breezy demeanor now draining away completely as it all registered. "Oh," she breathed – he wondered if she was aware she did so audibly. As her dark eyes filled with what he was certain was pity, Logan looked away, his initial reaction to Tony's gift now compounded not only with Max having to see it, but her reaction.

Max looked from the card to Logan, finding his eyes cast down, embarrassed, the blatant reminder of the changes in his life now clearly a bitter one for him. "Someone you haven't seen for a while?" she asked gently. At his snort and grudging nod, she went on, holding out the card as evidence, "but this guy is family, right, a cousin?" When he didn't react, she took it as acquiescence and pointed out, "and I've noticed you don't exactly have a lot of family albums around, ya know?" She nodded toward the box and offered, "he seems like a good guy, to send all this great stuff."

Logan had looked back up to Max as her words lured him back, and his eyes now softened, almost imperceptibly, even to Max. He nodded a little, eyes focusing well past her now. His thoughts seemed far away until he looked back to her, admitting, with a faint smile, "he is."

She nodded, winning the point. "And look at the bright side, then – he's got enough cash to send you a present like this, to talk about expensive vacations in this economy – life is good for him too, right?"

"_..him,__**too**__,"_Logan registered, wondering if Max really saw it that way, if she saw his life as 'good.' _If it is, Max, you have a lot to do with that..._ "Yeah, it is. He's doing alright."

She nodded, pausing only briefly before she went the next step, daring to add her thoughts on the moment, "good guy, doing okay ... bet he'd be able to take the news, if you cared to fill him in." Her words surprised him, uncharacteristic as it was for Max to press into his personal life, to suggest he wrestle his demons. Knowing Max, they probably surprised her a little, too. But she kept her gaze steady, her expression unchanged.

Of course, he blinked first. He shifted his gaze to the card, reaching over to gently ease it from her fingers, where she still held it out toward him, and dropped it dismissively onto the swim gear peering out at them from the box, closing the discussion. "So, anyway..." he said, sighing out the lingering hurt, "you came by for something...?"

Suddenly it was she who looked embarrassed, shaking her head, shrugging unconvincingly. "Oh, no; it wasn't anything, I'll just ..."

He looked at her more closely, yet again surprised by her reaction. "It was something..." he insisted, "Max?" He watched as she stopped struggling to avoid whatever it was. She sighed noisily, and her shoulders dropped.

"It _is_ nothing. That's the problem. Nothing great like those fins..." But she reached into her pocket, and pulling out a small, roughly-oblong shape, wrapped in brown shipping paper and tied in twine, thrust it toward him, almost brusquely. "Here. Happy birthday."

He reached out, and she dropped the form into his hand, a small, comfortable weight he hadn't expected for its size. Surprised, he asked, "how did you know it was today?"

"You told me..." she shifted, uncomfortably.

He shook his head, remembering the moment. "No, I said 'November,' not the date itself..." Given his less-than-enjoyable birthdays since his parents died, he _knew_ he hadn't mentioned the date, just so he could avoid it. "I don't think even Bling knows..." he speculated.

"Well, it _is_ on your driver's license, for the world to see." At her words, he looked back up from the small package in his hand, to see her backpedal a bit awkwardly. "What, you didn't _expect_ me to check, being all vague and secretive like that?"

He actually laughed, his dark mood washing away with the sound. "Actually, no, I _didn't_ expect you to go though my wallet to find it." But seeing her expression, and her sudden, apparent concern that he might be upset with her invasion, he added, sounding more self-conscious than he liked, "but ... it's nice to know that it mattered..."

She looked back into his eyes, weighing what she saw there, and finally relaxed into a tough-guy shrug. "Just wanted to be sure to be around for the cake." She let her eyes drop meaningfully back on the small brown lump in his hand and asked, "you gonna open it?"

"Oh– yeah," he shifted the small package around to pull off the twine and paper, and found a key ring, with a burnished, pewter fob in the shape of a chess piece – the king. He cupped it in his hand, feeling the cool surface contours in his palm, and was immediately struck by the irony: Max's gift was as emblematic of his new life, hidden away up above the city, in his chair, at a desk, as Tony's fins had been of his old one. Yet the concern he'd seen in Max, the fact that she was here, with him, the fact that she had given him a gift as within her means as Tony had within his, let him see his reality as maybe still having hope and possibility within it after all, admittedly much different than his old one, but bearing some promise of its own.

That was Max's best gift to him, he understood, looking back into the beautiful face, surprised again when he saw an uncharacteristic uncertainty there, as she worried that her present wouldn't measure up, looking for his reaction. When her eyes met his, he smiled wider.

"Thank you, Max," he said softly, simply. She snorted.

"Yeah, like it's something you were really hoping for..."

He smiled at that, and at seeing the tension in her shoulders dissolve away now, as he looked back to the key ring and its king. It wasn't much smaller than a regulation piece, and with the weight and rich patina, he even allowed himself to believe that she might have had to spend some time searching for such a thing. And it wasn't just a cheap knock-off, but quality, polished pewter; antique, maybe. Of course, Max was likely to know that, and might have had to dig fairly deep into her wages to buy it for him, too. _Thank you, Max, _Logan's thoughts went out to her,_ not just for the key ring, but for being here ... for pulling me out of myself, over and over ... for all that you've given me. _

"I was..." he assured her, "...in a way." He couldn't tell her his thoughts, at least not for now – and he fleetingly wondered if there would ever be a day he would tell her all that she meant to him. "Nice to have a reminder that I still have a few moves..." his smile became more settled, and her face lightened in a smile of her own to see it. "Yeah. Just what I wanted."

"Did you even _get_ a cake?" she tried, clearly not entirely altruistic in her curiosity.

He chuckled. "No." But lifting his eyes back to hers, he challenged, "not yet..." Seeing her eyes sparkle as he left his despondency further behind him, he added, "know where I can find one?"

She looked surprised. "You can't just make one? Even _I've_ baked a cake."

"You have?" Logan's surprise far outweighed hers, even amid his skepticism.

"Well, I helped Kendra once." He looked at her closely, waiting for the rest – and she caved, "okay, so I went out to find some of the ingredients for her. But I _watched._ It can't be that hard – I've seen you do a lot more involved things here, for dinner."

His chuckle in reply warmed the room and banished all traces of the earlier, darker moments Max had cleared away with her arrival. "Well, I've watched a couple times, too. What do you say I make us some dinner – finger food, something we can eat as we work – and we put our heads together and make us a cake?"

"Now_ that's_ what I'm talkin' about," she glowed. "You tell me what you need and I can find the ingredients."

He laughed, "No idea – Eyes Only will have to look into it. But I'll check and anything I don't have, or can't run out and get in time, I'll give you a call."

"Best Eyes Only mission I've had in a while," Max zipped her jacket up again, ready to go.

"Hey –" He sobered only a little and as her eyes met his, he offered her an escape. "Look – if you have plans ... we could do this another time. Pretty last minute and all..."

"Oh, no, Logan Cale. No way are you cheating me out of birthday cake. I may not have a birthday of my own but I know what to do with birthday cake. Now get to work finding out how to make one and let me know if you need me to bring supplies."

"Aye-aye," he beamed. _No wavering in that reply_, he noted happily. _Another gift to remember, this year..._

"Just ... be sure we make a good one." Her expression softened fondly, even without her knowing it did. "This one ought to be special."

"Very special," he promised warmly, filled with all Max had brought him that day. "Trust me – it just may be the best one ever."

_xoxoxoxoxoxx_

_**Happy Birthday, Logan!!**_


End file.
